This report absolutely blows my mind. The FED- the world banking cabal- loaned 16 trillion dollars during the height of the banking crisis? Do we have 16 trillion? Of course not. That is 2 trillion more than the annual Gross Domestic Product of the entire United States.

Answer this. If the FED has 16 trillion laying around...why the fuck did we have to loan banks 700 billion in TARP funds??? Anyone?? Can anyone answer this????

The FED made loans to foreign banks? Is there any doubt- any of you- that the FED is nothing other than international bankers bailing out an international fraud scheme- so that they can continue to fleece the minions of the world.

Please copy and paste this blog/link to any economist or person who you think can answer these questions. 'Cause I'd love to know the answers.

This report is outrageous. The FED is comprised of crooked international bankers that are about as "Federal" as I am King of the World. The report:

The Fed Audit

The first top-to-bottom audit of the Federal Reserve uncovered eye-popping new details about how the U.S. provided a whopping $16 trillion in secret loans to bail out American and foreign banks and businesses during the worst economic crisis since the Great Depression. An amendment by Sen. Bernie Sanders to the Wall Street reform law passed one year ago this week directed the Government Accountability Office to conduct the study. “As a result of this audit, we now know that the Federal Reserve provided more than $16 trillion in total financial assistance to some of the largest financial institutions and corporations in the United States and throughout the world,” said Sanders. “This is a clear case of socialism for the rich and rugged, you’re-on-your-own individualism for everyone else.”

Among the investigation’s key findings is that the Fed unilaterally provided trillions of dollars in financial assistance to foreign banks and corporations from South Korea to Scotland, according to the GAO report. “No agency of the United States government should be allowed to bailout a foreign bank or corporation without the direct approval of Congress and the president,” Sanders said.

The non-partisan, investigative arm of Congress also determined that the Fed lacks a comprehensive system to deal with conflicts of interest, despite the serious potential for abuse. In fact, according to the report, the Fed provided conflict of interest waivers to employees and private contractors so they could keep investments in the same financial institutions and corporations that were given emergency loans.

For example, the CEO of JP Morgan Chase served on the New York Fed’s board of directors at the same time that his bank received more than $390 billion in financial assistance from the Fed. Moreover, JP Morgan Chase served as one of the clearing banks for the Fed’s emergency lending programs.

In another disturbing finding, the GAO said that on Sept. 19, 2008, William Dudley, who is now the New York Fed president, was granted a waiver to let him keep investments in AIG and General Electric at the same time AIG and GE were given bailout funds. One reason the Fed did not make Dudley sell his holdings, according to the audit, was that it might have created the appearance of a conflict of interest.

To Sanders, the conclusion is simple. “No one who works for a firm receiving direct financial assistance from the Fed should be allowed to sit on the Fed’s board of directors or be employed by the Fed,” he said.

The investigation also revealed that the Fed outsourced most of its emergency lending programs to private contractors, many of which also were recipients of extremely low-interest and then-secret loans.

The Fed outsourced virtually all of the operations of their emergency lending programs to private contractors like JP Morgan Chase, Morgan Stanley, and Wells Fargo. The same firms also received trillions of dollars in Fed loans at near-zero interest rates. Altogether some two-thirds of the contracts that the Fed awarded to manage its emergency lending programs were no-bid contracts. Morgan Stanley was given the largest no-bid contract worth $108.4 million to help manage the Fed bailout of AIG.

A more detailed GAO investigation into potential conflicts of interest at the Fed is due on Oct. 18, but Sanders said one thing already is abundantly clear. “The Federal Reserve must be reformed to serve the needs of working families, not just CEOs on Wall Street.”

The thing I like best about Ron Paul is that he tells the truth. Of course he is a Libertarian. Let me deviate momentarily. I am constantly defending Libertarian views. Particularly drug legalization. By the way, anybody that thinks legalizing drugs and managing their use is not far superior to wasting billions of dollars and thousands of lives- should read the results of Portugal's drug legalization process. You probably haven't heard about it. Because it works. Profoundly better. Our government prefers you don't know that. Court systems unplugged, prison populations went down, death rates plunged. Anyway, back to Paul.

We are completely and utterly bankrupt. We cannot pay our bills. This fiasco, this debt ceiling debate is ridiculous. All they are debating is whether to add two trillion more in debt. That's it. And of course they will. They are spineless self centered pussies that all want to retain their status and power by getting re-elected next year. Defaulting scares the shit out of them.

The problem with arrogant fuckers like Paulson is that they think they know everything. Another member of the ruling class. Can you imagine the ego of a guy who ran Goldman Sachs and then as Treasury Secretary stole a trillion dollars to funnel back through AIG, to his bank, and buddies? Then this clown has the audacity to claim he is a hero- and I'll be damned if the same people he fleeced weren't buying his book. Why is it that the ego driven ruling class all have to write books about themselves? All the lives and careers this bastard must have ruined? Watching Bear Stearns collapse- his former competitor- like it was some sort of a mystery. Frankly I don't understand why the citizens of this country have not found Hank Paulson and stretched his neck for him. A testament to the sanity of the American herd, most likely.

I ain't that sane.

When I was a kid, growing up in Butte, and some arrogant, thieving bastard like Paulson was running his mouth- he simply got his ass kicked. Justice. On the spot. In fact, I have seen many instances of justice delivered that way over the years. Now I am not advocating violence here (snicker) but I'll tell ya what Hank. I'm not like those other sheep. I got teeth. You can even have the first swing.

In 2007, I pushed my Honda Valkyrie from Idaho to a little motel in Burnt Hills, New York. I spent the next ten days commuting N. to Saratoga Springs each day except Tuesdays- when they don't race.

A crappy room in a Saratoga Springs motel is 300 bucks a night during the race meet. I was more than happy to commute from Burnt Hills and my 50 dollar a night room. I partied with my neighbors at the motel- 4 older couples who had been going to Saratoga on opening week for something like 20 years. Friendships like that are fantastic.

I absolutely love Saratoga Springs. The main drag through town is decorated in horse racing themes. Statues of horses, colorful owners silks, outside dining. Quaint and charming. I ate breakfast each day at some place very close to the track. It was always packed and I'll be damned if I can think of the name of it.

The day I first arrived, I couldn't find the track. It is smack dab in the center of town, surrounded by houses. Many of the residents make good money selling parking spaces on their un used lots and lawns. I usually got a discount on the big Valk.

One day I won every race. I have done that three times in my life. (won every race on a card) Hows that for handicapping?

The race course is just as historic as the town is. It is well kept. If heaven looks anything like Saratoga Springs- I'm not gonna mind dying a bit. So while I can't be at Saratoga, I 'll have to settle for Les Bois today- gazing at the monitors and rooting in whatever horses I have bet on. The opening day at Saratoga is one of my favorite days of the year. Like the Kentucky Derby, I just don't miss it.

Thursday, July 21, 2011

For years, I avoided taking a stand on the death penalty. As a cop, people just assumed that I was a supporter of capital punishment. My problem with the death penalty is that I lacked spiritual intelligence. Let me repeat that. I was not spiritually correct or intelligent enough to render an opinion. I avoided any talk of the death penalty.

Odd, huh?

My job as a cop was simply to arrest violators and bring them before the judicial system. Other than evidence gathering, I had no interest in the outcome or the penalty. Now I say that, but the reality is- is that cops hate to arrest guilty people and watch them get off. It is very counter productive to what we are trying to achieve. Evidence gathering is hard work and it is time consuming.

The greatest serial murderers in the United States? Bundy, Gacy, Harvey? (names that end in Y for 500, Alex) nah...

Texas and Florida. http://www.ibtimes.com/articles/184136/20110721/who-is-arab-slayer-mark-stroman-texas-9-11-attack-al-qaeda-white-supremacist-lethal-injection-death.htm About a year ago, I got into a back and forth with some guy who is a huge death penalty proponent. Runs a blog of his own. Uses biblical quotes to try and sell his brand of justice. The problem with killing people is that it is not spiritually correct. In fact, it is spiritually sick. It's not that I am some candy ass or that I am trying to sell you on my belief system. I mean this IS just an opinion. It is simply my personal commitment to trying to be the best human being that I can be. And killing people doesn't fit that description of who I want to be. My adversary at that time, firmly believed that it was spiritually correct- dare I say God approved and perfectly normal- to put people to death.

Has it ever struck you as odd that we consider murderers to be horrible human beings yet when we do the murdering via the state- we can find any number of justifications that entitle us to do what we abhor. It's ok, when we do it. We have legitimate reasons. We have justice as our excuse.

And we don't call it what it is. We use more palatable terms. Capital punishment, lethal injection, things like that. Because when we kill someone, we do it in a humane way. We are better than they are, aren't we?

I listened to Helen Prejean speak a year or two ago near Boise. (Dead Man Walking) I listened very intently. It wasn't that she brought some new revelations to the table although her figures (and granted they were hers) stated that...in excess of 50% of murder victim families- if given a choice- would not choose capital punishment) The death penalty it appears, is just a political tool for cops, prosecutors, judges, and other politicians. Grieving families it seems, don't seek justice so much as ambitious prosecutors want death penalty convictions in furtherance of their careers. And if that's truly how we arrived here with the death penalty...I am certainly against death. Wrongful convictions aside.

In the end, we all decide what kind of people we are going to be and we make our choices. I am ok with that. I'm ok with the people who disagree with me. Sentencing people to death and carrying out the sentences has been no more effective in curbing murder rates than the "drug war" has been effective in stopping the illicit drug trade. I think at this point it's all morphed into some hideous political propaganda.

At any rate, thanks for allowing me to rant about something other than those buffoons in Washington and the never ending budget drama. Who knows...maybe I'll even conjure up that death blogger guy and get into another back and forth...

Wednesday, July 20, 2011

I snitched this story from the Republican Libertarian. It's about freedom but nobody ever seems to notice.

This story is about a small city government (Carpentersville, Il.) like the one I used to be a part of. Seems the center piece of this story, Doug Marks, is on the local council. Apparently he is a Libertarian and doesn't think government should be telling us how to live our lives.

In Carpentersville, you may have two dogs but no more. The story doesn't mention whether or not you are limited to a certain number of children or not. Marks, a dog lover and minority dweller, could not rally enough support to let people decide for themselves how many dogs they could own- thus raising the limit beyond two. http://www.dailyherald.com/article/20110719/news/707199703/at

In small town America, the subject of dogs is hallowed ground. I policed some of the most vicious fights and bitter arguments over dogs. I don't like government telling us how to live our lives but there has to be room for common sense while living in densely populated areas.

Do you know why we have laws governing the number of dogs? Because somebody, somewhere, had fifty of them. There was a pile of dog shit the size of Mount Everest. Or we saw on the news one of those crazy old women who owned 100 dogs and thus authorities had to bus the entire herd to four or five shelters when something medically rendered her incapable of caring for them.

That's the insanity of human beings. We remember some isolated story somewhere and now in our official capacity as small town rulers- we decide it is prudent to limit the number of dogs. That's how we think. We have contempt prior to any investigation. We made up our minds long ago when we heard about that crazy woman with her pack of dogs wreaking havoc on some poor Sheriff somewhere. Never mind that we knew virtually nothing in terms of details nor can we remember anything particularly relevant- we have already arrived at our conclusions.

In Moonbat Valley, we had a 3 dog rule. This in a town of 8000. I cannot remember a single call ever (25 years) asking us to enforce that law- which generally means one of three things. (A) Nobody violated the law. (B) Nobody knew about the law. (C) Nobody gave a shit about the law.

Personally, I like to think it was (C)

I had 4 dogs when I left Moonbat valley. I lived in the county. I had this crazy dog that would chew holes through the wood fence and escape. My neighbors would put her back in the yard and make some sort of makeshift repair to the fence. I had great neighbors.

I wish more people thought like Marks and not so much like a bunch of zombies with some vague memory captured while reading a newspaper 30 years ago. But in the new and "improved" United States, the statists think we have to have laws governing everything. Helmets and life jackets in Seattle, the number of dogs in Carpentersville. What we really need is a few more people like Marks who will question this idea that we need a law for everything.

Maybe moonbats and statists just hate freedom. Or maybe they want freedom for themselves and laws for everyone else. And of course they want someone to enforce those laws and someone else to pay for that. We see, from the top down to Carpentersville, just how well all that law passing is working out- don't we?

I got a kick out of yesterday's 200 point short covering dead cat bounce rally on the heels of President Obama's announcement that the Republicans were starting to play nice on the deficit and budget.

I was less than enthusiastic with that plan for two reasons. (1) The 3.7 trillion dollar reduction is chump change and will do nothing to pare existing debt levels. (2) Once again, these politicians continue to pillage the low and fixed income wage earners (Social Security) by reconfiguring how the CPI is calculated. They have already low- balled and manipulated the numbers inside the CPI to such an extent that they have rendered it useless as a measure of inflation anyway. The CPI along with the birth/death model inside the employment report is a perfect example of... "Figures Don't Lie, Liars Figure."

Gold and silver prices were slashed and burned late in the day as Obama humbly took credit for resolving things. Tonight the House has suddenly passed a 6 trillion dollar deficit reduction plan. There was no talk of this earlier in the day...but I am glad to hear of it. The Tea Party likes it- which means it will be watered down or die in the Senate or get vetoed if it gets kicked down the road to 1600 Pennsylvania Av.

When looking at existing debt rather than budget deficits...remember that in order to pay down principal on your existing debt- you must have enough free cash flow to fund current expenditures and enough money left over to hack away at the principal on the debt you have incurred. This is the trap the U.S. is caught in. We have borrowed and spent so much money that we can barely pay the interest on existing debt at these ridiculously low rates. Politicians are going to add an additional 2 trillion to existing debt levels and then pray like hell for a miracle. Like an additional 15 million tax paying jobs materializing out of nowhere. They need free cash flow badly but it ain't coming. Maybe ever. If that's the case and it sure looks like it is- we're toast. This is the end game. Adding two trillion in debt at this point means nothing. None of it will be re-paid.

And all of these spineless legislators will try to get re-elected next year. They will bank on the fact that the voters (a) are idiots (b) that we will forget about their chickenshit behavior in wrestling with the budget and the debt ceiling (c) and that most of the baby boomers will all be dead when finally someone far younger declares, "We are bankrupt."

Personally, I think the boomers are the greediest and most selfish generation this country has ever known. I am ashamed of my generation. Truly. Not that we'll care. We are a generation of economic sociopaths. Clearly we don't give a shit about anyone other than ourselves. That's what the 112th Congress is telling you right now. Boomers. Lawyers. Sociopaths. Let someone else pay the bill as long as we get ours.

That's the legacy my crowd leaves behind.

The stock market has become completely unhinged from reality as well. The boomers are manipulating that until it implodes. In fact, I am in awe at the willingness of bankers and people like Ben Bernanke to keep indices and equities levitating with funny money. The stock market is no more an indicator of the health of this country than the CPI is an accurate measure of real inflation. Sooner or later, this charade has to end. I can't wait to see the final version of the budget and listen to all of our legislators declaring how hard they fought, all the blood that they shed, and maybe President Screw Off taking credit as the grand facilitator.

Oh yea. The question. Are baby boomers economic sociopaths? Maybe even psychopaths? Well, not all of us. However, that representative sample of our generation was highly skewed with politicians- judging from all of the self serving sociopaths that we managed to elect. I hope subsequent generations can do better than we did. Shouldn't be too hard. Perhaps our kids will elect people with sound values- or maybe even someone with a math degree that isn't a lawyer. Or mentally ill.

More worries about European debt levels. Gold is now working it's way past 1600. Silver is still mired in at 40 which is a 40-1 ratio with gold. The historic standard ratio was 15-1. I could live with that pricing.

Central bankers are pretending to scratch their heads, telling the public gold isn't money. Please use our worthless paper instead. Gawd what I wouldn't give to hear Ron Paul ask Ben Bernanke one simple, direct, question. "Ben, do you personally own any physical gold or silver?"

There are two sports I detest. Soccer and bicycling. I suppose virtually anyone can climb on a bicycle or kick a ball. That doesn't take a high degree of skill. The moonbats might disagree. They love soccer and bicycling because it gives them something to do when they are not drinking wine or planning new laws to govern how the rest of us should live.

Today I shall talk about idiots on bikes.

Most of us learn how to ride bicycles when we are children. In the old days, parents taught their children to ride by holding onto the bike, running along side of us while holding the contraption upright, and then giving us a huge shove. Oftentimes this tactic resulted in the handlebars getting thrust violently to one side or the other and we would wind up crashing into a giant heap and gathering road debris with our asses. Moonbats would never allow such an episode now. I've seen their children on bikes with helmets, elbow and knee pads, training wheels and horns. If moonbat children fall over, there are therapists and injury lawyers made available to them.

Most of us managed to survive learning to ride a bicycle without a helmet. More people are killed each year as pedestrians than will ever be killed on bicycles. But good helmet marketing by corporate America, central planning, peer pressure and law devising by the moonbats will make you think that death is imminent should you leave a helmet at home. In fact, I gather nasty looks from moonbats all of the time. They are professionals.

Oftentimes, I ride my motorcycle without a helmet. My favorite thing while riding the big bike is spotting a moonbat family on bicycles, all wearing helmets. I wait for them to give me one of those "you are a dumb ass looks" and when that happens- I like to glance back at them, roll my eyes, and shake my head. Sometimes I just forcefully exhale air and make some disgusting guttural noise - because I learned that in Libertarian charm school. I don't know about you....but...

When people tell me to do something, even discreetly or by visual cues, very often I buy twenty bucks worth of kiss my ass.

Each weekend, in Woodside, Ca., hundreds of grown men men dress up in their Lance Armstrong suits. Yellow, red, and blue nylon suits. Italian names and logos emblazoned everywhere. Helmets that look like alien heads. They look like dorks. The first time I saw this I thought it was Halloween. Up and down La Canada Road they would ride. Skinny men. Old men. Women. It is like some sort of bay area fashion show. Fortunately, in Idaho that adult idiocy hasn't caught on yet. The other day I did spot one of those buffoons at a coffee shop walking around is his suit with the funny bicycle shoes. Imagine my shock when he told the gal at the counter he was from San Jose.

That reminds me. I have to call Governor Otter and make sure we are locking the gates at night. I think a few left coast nutters on bikes are sneaking in. Maybe we could get one of those checkpoints like California has. To hell with fruit and vegetable questions. We will ask people probing questions. Turn them back if they sound like moonbats or have bicycle racks. Or if their car has one of those co-exist bumper stickers on it. We will just impound it and ship it back to Vallejo.

Thankfully, unlike Seattle, you can still ride a bicycle without a helmet in Boise. The statists are not in control here. Personally, I simply can't ride a bike anymore. Too many negative connotations attach. I have that picture of Obama on his bike with that alien geek helmet sticking up on his noggin as he rode around Martha's Vinyard this spring. That cinched it for me. My bicycling days are over.